Feed the trolls!
July 12, 2014 8:46 AM   Subscribe

Internet troll Jay Branscomb found a publicity photo of Steven Spielberg sitting next to a model of a dead Triceratops and posted it to Facebook along with a caption saying we need to "name and shame this despicable man." The resulting firestorm by anti-hunters was amusing, to say the least.
posted by Chocolate Pickle (35 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: Eh, sorry for the delayed delete; the silly fun of this is pretty well soured by the Daily Mail framing it as culture-war fight-fodder. -- LobsterMitten



 
This shit isn't funny in the slightest, Spielberg has a history of pulling crap like this along stealing alien children, planning raids on third world countries, hustling innocent women for money and colluding with aliens.

Never trusted a bearded man.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 9:00 AM on July 12, 2014 [15 favorites]


Stupid is as stupid does.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:01 AM on July 12, 2014


Stupid is as stupid does.

Yes, I am still angry about Robert Zemeckis's career, too.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:03 AM on July 12, 2014 [7 favorites]


This is pretty funny.

Eventually hipsters will discover hunting for the blindingly obvious portion of responsible wildlife management that is is, with the organic food it provides, the socially sustainable distribution it has always had in the US (Where game has always been the property of the people rather than aristocrats), and how it saves hundreds of lives by thinning populations of dangerous predator-less animals, but until that day comes internet commenters will continue to prefer meat to arrive tortured, diseased and on sterile seeming on styrofoam packets rather than from happier places.
posted by Blasdelb at 9:04 AM on July 12, 2014 [4 favorites]


Did none of them consider that he might have been hunting to put food on his family?!
posted by Jacqueline at 9:05 AM on July 12, 2014 [12 favorites]


Oh Facebook people. Don't ever change
posted by ShawnString at 9:07 AM on July 12, 2014


In fairness, I think that "I don't care who he is he should not have shot that animal" could have been a particularly dry quip. Doesn't explain the many, many other comments, though, unless the internet really enjoys self-parody.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:07 AM on July 12, 2014


Yes, I am still angry about Robert Zemeckis's career, too.

and Spielberg was instrumental in making that happen as well. The man is a goddamned monster.
posted by philip-random at 9:07 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


Or, far more probably, a bunch of people saw a joke post about Spielberg hunting dinosaurs, understood that it was a joke, and decided to commit to the bit.
posted by running order squabble fest at 9:09 AM on July 12, 2014 [14 favorites]


Apparently this was meant as a comment on the meteoric career of that young Belgian L'oreal model/soccer fan/big game huntress?

VH1 is streaming the "Where Are They Now" about her on Monday.
posted by notyou at 9:09 AM on July 12, 2014


Your third piece of evidence has already disappeared down the memory hole, Brandon Blatcher. How deep does this Spielberg/alien/hunting conspiracy go? Me, I think it's all retrospective stealth marketing for Alien Vs Predator, aimed at time travellers.
posted by Sonny Jim at 9:11 AM on July 12, 2014 [2 favorites]


Seriously though, it's fucking dumb that Axelle Despiegelaere's hunting photo and caption caused any kind of controversy. Speaking as an American and non-hunter, we're not all big dumb babies in big dumb diapers.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 9:12 AM on July 12, 2014


I have a hard time believing people think this is real.. They're simply having fun. The internet is stupid. Oh, and also.. Hipsters know all about hunting! They hunt at Brooklyn Flea for the best pickles and toast..
posted by ReeMonster at 9:12 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


Just in case there is anyone out there who hasn't cottoned on to Branscomb's original gag, he has posted a new photo, this time featuring Spielberg almost 20 years earlier when he was filming Jaws in 1975.
Just in case, yes. Any time on the Interwebs will teach us that there is no satire so broad that some will not take it at face value. If anything, the picture of Spielberg and Bruce seemed to fly past more people: Spielberg is fixed in the popular imagination as a fiftyish man with beard and glasses, and the clean-shaven 27-year-old with no specs (and posing with an animal that some people might vaguely understand has actually existed more recently than the Mesozoic) is somewhat less recognizable.

I am sure some are playing along with the gag. I am equally sure that many more are not.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:15 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


(Like, "It will take years for En-Gen to clone another one"... I'm guessing that was probably somebody getting the joke, not somebody who believes En-Gen exists, and clones dinosaurs.)
posted by running order squabble fest at 9:15 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]




I can't believe people are trying to defend him by saying the Triceratops is extinct.

That only makes it worse.
posted by kyrademon at 9:21 AM on July 12, 2014 [15 favorites]


Mod note: One comment deleted; please don't do the "here's what some idiot I disagree with might say" hyperbolic-ironic thing, it makes discussion suck. Thanks.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:30 AM on July 12, 2014


Eventually hipsters will discover hunting for the blindingly obvious portion of responsible wildlife management that is is, with the organic food it provides, the socially sustainable distribution it has always had in the US (Where game has always been the property of the people rather than aristocrats), and how it saves hundreds of lives by thinning populations of dangerous predator-less animals, but until that day comes internet commenters will continue to prefer meat to arrive tortured, diseased and on sterile seeming on styrofoam packets rather than from happier places.

I'm pretty sure most of the non-joke instances of this type of thing involve images of people that hunt endangered animals, and especially those endangered animals that are not killed for their meat. I'm sure there's a reason why you're smarter than those people, too, though.
posted by invitapriore at 9:33 AM on July 12, 2014 [7 favorites]


it's fucking dumb that Axelle Despiegelaere's hunting photo and caption caused any kind of controversy.

I'll try again. Why is it dumb? She killed an animal that's nearing threatened status on the conversation lists (East African oryx) -- yeah, it's not a white rhino, but it's still an animal that conservationists have indicated needs protection. Posing with a corpse like that is not something that has gone well for any other hunter who's published those photos on social media, so it seems to me that it was pretty fucking dumb for her to do that.

In addition, while the "Ready to go hunt some Americans haha" caption on that photo was probably trash talk related to World Cup, I kind of feel like it's a really boneheaded move to publish a photo of yourself with a gun on social media and then talk about killing people, in any context. I know, I know, she's Belgian, she's not steeped in American culture and can't be expected to know that posing with a gun and talking about killing Americans won't go over well with some people. I don't care. I still think what she did is dumb as hell. Maybe she'll learn an important lesson about how one behaves after one accepts a modeling contract from a multinational corporation.
posted by palomar at 9:37 AM on July 12, 2014 [8 favorites]


I wouldn't expect most people to recognize the word triceratops as a dinosaur and I don't think it's reasonable to expect most people to recognize the "animal" in the photo as a dinosaur, as opposed to something extant like an elephant or rhino.

And it's not just a funny prank that exploits people's (excusable) ignorance about dinosaurs — the reaction to these outraged tweets is to equate people who oppose recreational hunting with stupid people we rightly mock.

Laughing that people got suckered by a good prank ... that's fine. Laughing at them because this proves that people who oppose recreational hunting are idiots ... that's not fine.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:38 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


Where is this hipster shit coming from?
posted by maxsparber at 9:41 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


I wouldn't expect most people to recognize the word triceratops as a dinosaur and I don't think it's reasonable to expect most people to recognize the "animal" in the photo as a dinosaur, as opposed to something extant like an elephant or rhino.

Really? I would. I'm certainly not laughing at anyone because they oppose recreational hunting.
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 9:46 AM on July 12, 2014


Where is this hipster shit coming from?

Europe.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:47 AM on July 12, 2014


I like the implication that hipsters are super into factory farmed meats. Come on, man. What are some words we equate with hipsters and their foodstuffs? Locavore. Artisinal. Organic. Sustainable.

If we were talking about photos of an average hunter with their kill, I could maybe get behind a little of the sneering "ugh, hipsters won't shut up" business. But we're talking about a dumb meme featuring a photo of an animatronic dinosaur, which was spurred by a photo of a pretty blond girl kneeling behind her safari kill. I don't think she killed that animal because it was a predator or part of a large herd that needed thinning, and I doubt she ate any of it. Probably kept the head, though, because that'll be a fine trophy.

It's not sustenance hunting that gets people riled up, and I think you know that.
posted by palomar at 9:49 AM on July 12, 2014 [4 favorites]


Where is this hipster shit coming from?

Here.

I wouldn't expect most people to recognize the word triceratops as a dinosaur and I don't think it's reasonable to expect most people to recognize the "animal" in the photo as a dinosaur, as opposed to something extant like an elephant or rhino.

Well, I think many people would both recognize "triceratops" as a type of dinosaur and understand the photo, but still be inclined to have some fun with it. This FPP has chosen an odd angle to try to argue that opponents of hunting are stupid, which - ironically - depends on the uncritical acceptance of a single link to a famously unreliable source known for its trolling of the credulous.
posted by running order squabble fest at 9:50 AM on July 12, 2014


I wouldn't expect most people to recognize the word triceratops as a dinosaur and I don't think it's reasonable to expect most people to recognize the "animal" in the photo as a dinosaur, as opposed to something extant like an elephant or rhino.

it's also not reasonable for them to know about an obscure art movie such as jurassic park or the guy who directed it
posted by pyramid termite at 9:58 AM on July 12, 2014


the reaction to these outraged tweets is to equate people who oppose recreational hunting with stupid people we rightly mock.

There is hardly enough evidence to make the thorough "stupid people," but FACTS DON'T REAL ONLY FEELS is stupid and worthy of mockery.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 10:01 AM on July 12, 2014


Right now over on TPM there's a top-rated comment (in an otherwise irrelevant discussion) that consists of the kind of unconsciously recursive joke "that joke is so old last time I heard it I fell off my dinosaur". But I can't help thinking this kind of thing isn't even recognized as a joke in some parts of America.
posted by George_Spiggott at 10:08 AM on July 12, 2014


Also, I'm thinking that being called stupid and credulous by the Daily Mail ferfuxsake should get you some kind of award.
posted by George_Spiggott at 10:14 AM on July 12, 2014


Am I missing something, or is this all about 3 commenters being mocked by the Daily Fail being inflated into A Thing?
posted by zombieflanders at 10:35 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


I'm sorry, but if you are this easy to prank, it ain't being a troll.
posted by clvrmnky at 10:35 AM on July 12, 2014


Am I missing something, or is this all about 3 commenters being mocked by the Daily Fail being inflated into A Thing?

That's what I thought it was...but now is it supposed to be about "lol those dumb anti-hunters!!!" ?

Because that isn't really funny.
posted by jnnla at 10:36 AM on July 12, 2014


She killed an animal that's nearing threatened status on the conversation lists (East African oryx) -- yeah, it's not a white rhino, but it's still an animal that conservationists have indicated needs protection.

At the "least threatened" level, like ostriches.

I know, she's Belgian, she's not steeped in American culture and can't be expected to know that posing with a gun and talking about killing Americans won't go over well with some people. I don't care.

As a member of the dominant hegemony, that is certainly your right and privilege.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 10:38 AM on July 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


Nope, the East African oryx is currently in "nearly threatened" status. That is not "least threatened" level. Try harder.
posted by palomar at 10:41 AM on July 12, 2014


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